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by f0rever15elf



Category: The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Other, Pedro Pascal - Freeform, death mention, head injury mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-18
Updated: 2020-10-18
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:20:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,628
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27076381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/f0rever15elf/pseuds/f0rever15elf
Summary: Space is lonely and one night while Din is out on a hunt, that loneliness hits you. Thankfully, Din isn’t gone long
Relationships: Din Djarin & Reader, Din Djarin/You, The mandalorian / reader, the mandalorian/ you
Comments: 2
Kudos: 76





	Home

**Author's Note:**

> Did I spend ten minutes looking for the name for tape in the star wars universe? We don’t need to talk about that. Did I also spend twenty minutes trying to determine what planet they go to? Also don’t need to talk about that! (the answer is yes to both)

If anyone had told you two cycles ago that you would be traveling the galaxy with one of the most fearsome of bounty hunters, you would never have believed them. If they had told you that you’d be caring for some strange little green imp with the biggest ears and shiniest brown eyes you had ever seen, you’d have laughed at them. And if they had told you that you would be the acting mechanic for one of the most beaten up ships to ever jump to hyperspace, you’d have laughed so hard you would have been in tears.

And yet, here you are, standing with your body half inside the wall of the Razor Crest, hydrospanner in one hand and bonding tape clenched between your teeth. A string of profanities in a multitude of languages spill from your lips as you contort yourself to affix the loosened wires back to their appropriate panels. Stupid rust bucket was held together with bonding tape, louar clamps, and the breath of a prayer to the Maker. At one point, your bare finger brushes the exposed wire and it arcs with a rather loud pop. Your hand tightens into a fist from the electricity and you yank it back, swearing in every language you know when you drop the hydrospanner and it clanks down to the lower panel. You wrap the wires in bonding tape, insulating them before deciding to just tape the damn things to the wall of the panel. Good enough for now.

“Well, kriff,” you hiss, wiggling out of the wall as you wipe your brow. You had a spare spanner, but now you need to take off the lower panel to get the good one back. Having tools bumping around inside the walls of the ship is never a good idea. You kick the toolbox shut, having had enough of this for now, and you head up to the cockpit to go find your companions, Din Djarin the Mandalorian and his little green son. He had yet to name the creature, instead simply calling him _ad’ika_. You had asked him what it meant and he told you it meant ‘little one’ in the tongue of his people, the tongue of the Mandalorians. He told you it was used by parents to call their children. You nodded, and decided you quite liked the sound of the word, and so you took to calling the curious creature that as well. And so it went for two cycles.

Still grumbling and covered in grime from the wall, you climb up to the cockpit where Din sits, the child on his lap cooing happily as he reaches for the levers of the ship. Din spins the chair to face you when he hears you come up and you can feel the questioning judgment in his eyes, though you cannot see them through the visor. When he sees you, the baby coos and wiggles from Din’s grip, so he sets the baby on the floor. The little womp rat waddles his way over to you and you smile despite the irritation the ship is causing you, scooping the little one into your arms and rubbing his ear affectionately. “Hey little guy,” you murmur, giving his wrinkled forehead a kiss as you make your way to the copilot seat, collapsing into it with a huff.

“Rough day?” comes the gruff, modulated voice and you laugh without humor.

“Dropped the hydrospanner. Gonna need to take off the lower panel in the carbonite chamber when we land next to get it back. Fixed the short, but I haven’t put the wall back up after I shocked the ever loving kriff out of my hand.” Din nods, looking back out at the stars racing by. He never really said much, content with the quiet. Your eyes drift down to the little green child in your lap, happily playing with the silver chain around your neck as he babbles.

You aren’t sure how long the three of you sat in comfortable silence, but eventually, Din begins preparing for a drop out of hyperspace. He had picked up another bounty back on Navaro, and it had taken the both of you to a barren, rocky planet in the Outer Rim called Agamar. Well… no frolicking in the grassy fields for the little one, it seemed. You’ll be keeping him inside here. At least you wouldn’t be needing to pry small creatures from his mouth. His teeth were exceptionally pointy and his apatite was voracious.

“This place used to be a hideout for the Empire. Stay inside, keep ground protocol active at all times. I’ll deactivate it with my vambrace when I come back.” You nod at his orders, the child wiggling in your arms as he reaches for his father. Din strokes his ear once before slinging his pulse rifle across his shoulder and heading out. You watch as the door closes behind him, leaving you and the child alone.

“Well, _ad’ika_. While dad is away, the kids will play.” You smile at him, taking him up to the cockpit for a closer look at the buttons Din never lets him near, and he is over the moon with excitement. He babbles incessantly as you let his little hands brush over the buttons and switches. It’s honestly adorable, even if you have no idea what he’s saying. Eventually though, he tires, yawing as you cradle him to you and sing to him the lullaby your mother used to sing to you. It isn’t long before those shiny eyes slip closed as he succumbs to sleep. With a gentle smile, you lay him in his pram, tucking him in and closing the lid before heading down to your own cot.

Your chrono slowly ticks the time away as you lay staring at the ceiling. You really should fix that panel but you really don’t want to, and so you don’t. You elect to stay in bed, staring at the slate gray ceiling as your mind wanders.

Two cycles. Two whole cycles you had been traveling the galaxy with Din. You had seen awfully fantastic places, and fantastically awful places, and you truthfully enjoyed every minute of it. But at the same time… space is lonely, even when you aren’t traveling alone. You close your eyes, feeling the tears bubbling up as you try desperately not to cry.

The truth was, you _are_ alone. Everything you had ever known had ever known had been crushed under the heel of the empire. Your home had been turned to ash and rubble, you friends and parents taken from you in one way or another. The entire town had been leveled, everyone either kidnapped or killed as the Empire swept through without mercy. How you had managed to survive you still don’t know, buried under all of that rubble that left you with a nasty concussion. That was where Din had found you, sweeping through the destroyed town out of curiosity more than anything as he hunted his latest bounty. You had been trying to dig yourself out of the mess of rubble, disoriented and vision blurred from the trauma to your head paired with your tears. He bombarded you with questions when he got you out, questions you had no answer to.

By all counts, he should have left you there. You had very little in the way of skills that you could offer him, and you would have just been another mouth to feed, but he took you in anyways. He taught you the way around his ship, taught you to care for the little one, taught you to tend to his wounds. He had become your friend. Your only friend. Most nights, you didn’t think about that little four letter modifier. _Only_. But some nights, especially the nights Din leaves for a hunt… space reminds you how lonely you are.

You give into your tears, rolling onto your side with you back to the cargo bay as sobs wrack your chest. You miss your mother and father, your siblings. You miss your best friend and all the strange animals she was always bringing home. You miss the taste of your mother’s cooking and the sound of her voice. You miss _home_. And it leaves a hollow ache so potent in your chest that you feel as though you can’t breathe, gasping for air as your sob wrack your chest.

You don’t expect Din back for at least a day, so when the door to the bay drops open while your sobs still tear from your throat, the momentary shock brings you to pause. Din stomps in, a body slung across his shoulders when he sees you on your cot with tears staining your face. His heart clenches in his chest with worry, but he has to take care of this quarry first. He slams the button to close the bay before turning to head to store the quarry. The shock gives way to agony once more and you lay back down to lament your loss. Even when the sound of his boots on the metal floor signals his return, you don’t stop. You can’t. He calls your name with a gentle voice you’ve only heard him use with the child and it startles you, causing you to roll over and stare at him with red, teary eyes. He’s knelt by your cot, hand hovering as if unsure whether or not to touch you. Seeing your eyes makes his decision for him and he reaches out to grab your shoulder, gently turning you towards him.

“What’s wrong?” he questions as a gloved hand carefully wipes the stray tears from your cheeks. Your lip trembles as you stare at him, the gesture of kindness uncharacteristic. He’s worried you’re hurting somehow, possibly having injured yourself while repairing the ship. Worry courses through his veins though he does his best to keep his voice flat and calm, thankful that the modulator would help in this task.

“”m alone,” you whimper, your tears stubbornly refusing to stop.

“I’m right here…?” he says, and it sounds far more like a question than a statement and you shake your head vehemently.

“No. I’m alone. I… I miss them, Din.” The Mandalorian stiffens, realizing only then what it is you mean. He understands you. He understands you so much more than you realize. This suffering he had seen before, felt before as he mourned the loss of his home and family the day the Mandalorians found him, just as he had found you.

“I understand,” the modulated voice soothes as best it can. He pulls you closer to the edge of the cot, and you oblige, shivering against the beskar when he pulls you out of the cot and into his lap as he sits on the ground. You were far too old to be his foundling when he found you in that rubble, closer to his age than to that of a child, but he couldn’t just leave you there to die, alone and afraid. His heart wouldn’t let him.

For two cycles he kept you at his side, teaching you everything you needed to know to be of use on the ship. You had been determined to earn your keep, though the smile on your face whenever you played with the child or saw a new planet for the first time would have been enough payment to last lifetimes for Din. You held such a special place in his heart, and he quickly became unable to imagine a time without you.

Everything went unspoken for two cycles, and he begins regretting that now, thinking he should have told you everything sooner. He should have told you of his childhood and upbringing. He should have told you how your smile is one of the things he looks forward to every time he comes back from a hunt. But instead, he kept his silence, and now you felt you had to suffer these feelings of loneliness and loss alone, not knowing that he knows exactly the grief you are feeling. And so, he tells you everything. “I lost my parents to the Empire as well.”

Surprise stiffens your body and you look up to him, cradled in his lap. “What?” you rasp, your voice thick with tears.

“They destroyed my village when I was a boy. Burnt it to the ground. That’s where the Mandalorians found me and took me in as a foundling, an adopted child. I was completely alone.” His visor tilts down and you can tell he’s watching you, gauging your reaction. “I mourned for my parents for years. I would spend nights crying in my bed before I came of age and swore the creed wishing I could go back and change everything. It felt like I had a hole in my chest that no amount of compassion from the Mandalorians could fill. I understand.”

He… he understands…. And not just in the sympathetic way people claim when they want to seem remorseful. No, he _actually_ understands. He empathizes with you in a way you never thought possible, and you find yourself apologizing. “I’m… I’m sorry, Din, I didn’t know.”

“No, because I never told you. It never came up. We are incredibly alike, _cyar’ika_. All three of us are.” The trembles remaining from your sobs have all but ceased as Din holds you against him, a gloved hand holding your own as he traces a thumb lightly over your knuckles.

He’s right, you realize. The three of you, a little band of those who are completely alone, come together so that you no longer have to suffer that ache of loneliness. The child and Din had a special bond as father and son, and Din had brought you in, trusted you to witness such a thing and even care for the one he called his son as if he were your own. Let you refer to the child by the same affectionate name he used. This… this is a family, you realize. You are a family.

Din watches as a spectrum of emotions wash over your face, your eyes widening as you look back up to him, breathing out a gentle “ _oh.”_

“We may have started alone. We may have suffered so greatly to get us to this point. But the three of us…” he says as he cups your cheek gently, bringing the forehead of his helmet to rest against the skin of your own in an action that feels so intimate. “The three of us aren’t alone anymore. We have each other. My home is with the little one.” He murmurs your name, the emotion almost lost through the modulator. “I want you to be a part of that. I want this to be your home.”

Your mouth falls open as your eyes brim with tears again, for an entirely different reason. “ _Home_ ,” you whisper, and it is full of longing and desire for something you thought you would never have again. You quickly close your eyes, your forehead still pressed against the helmet of the Mandalorian you had come to grow so attached to as you take a shaky breath and nod. Din releases a breath he doesn’t realize he had been holding, his thumb stroking your cheek again as you bring your hand to lay atop of his. “You, me, and _ad’ika._ This is home. We are home.” His breath catches in his throat as he leans back just enough to nod, and he wishes you could see the reverent smile on his face as he does. One day you would. He echoes the phrase back to you, and it sounds every bit of a promise. 

“We are home.”


End file.
